Chasing dreams and the ghost of my soul

Fair warning, this will get personal. An e-journal, with little held back. Language may be coarse, the content may get dark or bizarre, but its as much or more for me as it is for you all. I think maybe sharing it openly will help me.

I'm tired. I'm loosing it, or have I already lost it? I hate the 20-something year old children that go to my school, that live in and trash my neighborhood, that I'm going to end up working with or teaching, and have no desire to participate in this bullshit anymore. Screw my overpriced pest infested apartment complex, the path to 'success', this winter bullshit, fuck it all. I'm done, I'm out. Taking my ball and going...

I don't sleep well at night anymore. Dreaming of the openness of the Plains, the massifs of the Rockies, the sands of the beach and the desert, keeps me awake, calling to me. The simplicity of life on the road. Can't ignore it, can't shake it, just gotta go... just gotta go...

I think I come to this wanderlust honest at least, from my Dad's side anyways. My Great Grandparents immigrated to America. Grandparents traveled every year, all over the country, until they divorced, and my grandfather was a tour bus driver to satisfy his need to move about. My father retired and has spent the last 2 years more or less wandering the earth without spending more than 9 months in any one place. Several cross country trip, china, backpacked across Europe, and is currently somewhere in Alaska last I talked to him, itching to get going again.

My own travels started when I was 8, the summer after my parents divorced. My dad handed me a map and a highlighter and let me plan the summer vacation. Six or seven weeks and we did a whirlwind tour of the US. Every year after that we would spend most of my summer vacation on the road, the best way to talk me out of wanting a new toy or video game was to say "you can have this now, or we can put the money towards the trip this summer". The trip always won. The last trip we took together was when I was 15, toured Western Europe.

I'm 27 now. When I was 25, I was finally able to make my first multiweek trip since that trip to Europe and chose to ride the TAT to Salida. 22 days and the seeds were planted... I have to go back. I have to see the desert and the mountains and the plains. I have to see the Pacific this time. And I don't have to come back.

The plan is to head south to where its warm(er), the west, until I run out of land. Then figure something out from there. I've got money in the bank, GPS tracks, waypoints, the TAT, OBDR, CDT, and more loaded to go, the bike has had all her shots and services, and I'm currently sorting my luggage, putting what needs to be kept into storage or safe keeping, and mentally preparing myself for this. I'm looking to take the Autotrain to Florida, riding to Key West (my fourth and final corner of the lower 48), then along the gulf coast, New Orleans, San Antonio, Austin, and west along the border eventually to San Diego. But nothing is set in stone. I want to keep riding until I find somewhere that feels right.

So follow along if you will. I hope you enjoy the journey, hopefully I do too. All I know is I'm looking for something out there, part of me that's missing or is just hiding maybe, or just fulfilling the dreams laid down nearly 20 years ago with that highlighter and the experiences of so many yesterdays.

Good luck on the journey. Everybody needs a mental enema every so often. When you make it to California I have an extra room. I am located 50 miles north of San Diego, near Laguna. I also have a WR2....

End of this week to early next week. I'm still not happy with how everything is packed. I need to stop fiddling, or I just need to get it right and tight.

I'm trying to avoid side rack, else I'd just have dirtbaz again. But this is too top heavy, visually anyways, to really please me...

sideways, out of the wind...

crossways... too close to the exhaust?

FWIW, top bag is my clothes in a waterproof compression sack, down sleeping bag in a wateproof compression sack, BA IAC sleeping pad, 2 MSR bottles, front and rear spare tubes, air pillow, toiletries, mallet for pounding stakes, and a camp towel. Left saddle bag are camp shoes (actually soft, floppy boots), cook kit (alcohol stove, small pot, fork, lid, handle, sierra cup, and fuel), and my tent stakes. Right bag is reserved for shelter, which will likely be a golite hex3 with nest in addition to a bivy and small tarp. The pole will go in the duffel. Tools in the tank bag.

Packing for wintry and swing season conditions blows, summer stuff is small and lightweight, winter stuff is necessarily bulkier.

If anyone has a suggestion for carrying spare tubes other than 'not', which I'd like to do but don't trust patches all that well, I'm all ears. Jesus these things take up a ton of space. So does the air pad fwiw, but damn its comfortable.

I do in this idea too, which how I think I'm going to go (plus the saddlebags). Might get a cheap cordura stuff sack to go over the sea to summit bag though, not sure how well or long it'll hold up on the rack exposed. Paired with a wolfman enduro duffel in the photo.